As the value and use of information continues to increase, individuals and businesses seek additional ways to process and store information. One option available to users is information handling systems. An information handling system generally processes, compiles, stores, and/or communicates information or data for business, personal, or other purposes thereby allowing users to take advantage of the value of the information. Because technology and information handling needs and requirements vary between different users or applications, information handling systems may also vary regarding what information is handled, how the information is handled, how much information is processed, stored, or communicated, and how quickly and efficiently the information may be processed, stored, or communicated. The variations in information handling systems allow for information handling systems to be general or configured for a specific user or specific use such as financial transaction processing, airline reservations, enterprise data storage, or global communications. In addition, information handling systems may include a variety of hardware and software components that may be configured to process, store, and communicate information and may include one or more computer systems, data storage systems, and networking systems.
Information handling systems (IHSs) typically use some form of active and/or passive thermal management to direct heat away from heat generating components contained within the IHS. For example, one or more fans may be included within a chassis or housing of an IHS to provide active cooling to one or more heat generating components contained therein. In another example, heat generating components may be thermally coupled to a heat sink (e.g., a heat exchanger, metal chassis or other thermally conductive component within the IHS), which functions to passively draw heat away from the heat generating components. In some cases, a heat pipe may be coupled to one or more heat generating components for directing heat away to a heat sink, or another active or passive cooling component, of the IHS.
In addition to active and passive cooling, thermal management schemes are often used to slow down, or even shut down, heat sensitive components when temperatures become too great. For example, the clock speed of a processing device (e.g., a central processing unit, CPU, or graphics processing unit, GPU) may be slowed to reduce the amount of heat produced by the processing device. This type of thermal management scheme, referred to as “thermal throttling,” helps the processing device to cool down by reducing the operating speed of the device. Thermal throttling may also be used to control the amount of heat generated by other IHS components, such as a platform controller hub (PCH), memory, and solid state storage devices (SSDs).
Some information handling systems, such as portable IHSs (e.g., notebook computers, tablet computers, smart phones, etc.), network devices (e.g., gateways, etc.) and Internet of Things (IoT) devices, may be temporarily or permanently located in hot ambient environments, such as outdoors or inside a hot vehicle, storage cabinet, etc. In some cases, the external ambient temperature in which an IHS is deployed may reach up to 70° C. or more. Such high external ambient temperatures can present significant problems to the operation of these systems if active/passive cooling components and thermal management schemes are unable to reduce internal temperatures below the thermal design power (TDP) of the components contained therein. For this reason, manufactures often provide temperature ratings for operating the system or components contained therein.
For example, a solid-state storage drive (SSD) included within an IHS may have a maximum temperature rating of about 85° C. Tcase (i.e., the temperature measured at the top of the SSD case or housing) and a thermal throttle temperature rating of about 70° C. Tcase. The read/write speed of the SSD is reduced when the SSD temperature (e.g., Tcase) reaches the thermal throttle temperature rating. Once the maximum temperature rating is reached, the SSD is automatically shut down to prevent permanent damage to the SSD.
At high external ambient temperatures (e.g., 70° C. and above), internal ambient temperature surrounding the SSD can easily exceed the maximum temperature rating of the SSD, often making the storage device the most critical component constraining overall system performance. While various passive cooling techniques (such as coupling the SSD to a heat sink, thermal pad, metal chassis or enclosure of the IHS) have been used in the past to draw heat away from the storage device at lower external ambient temperatures (e.g., temperatures below 70° C.), there are currently no thermal management solutions that enable an SSD to support high external ambient temperatures up to its maximum temperature rating (e.g., 85° C.).